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| Executive
Speeches
Address to the Security Council meeting on Children
in Armed Conflict
by Eliza,
New York, 5 May 2002 -
SECURITY COUNCIL MEETING ON CHILDREN
AND ARMED CONFLICT
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Other
Security Council Speeches
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Good morning ladies and gentlemen. My
name is Eliza. I am 17 years old and I come from Bosnia
and Herzegovina.
War. . . . . it sounds horrible and it's very hard
to describe how awful it is when you actually live through
one. Your whole world is falling apart. Everything that
you know disappears. The only thing you can see is fear
and death. You feel captured in every way. You're asking
questions but there are no answers. You're seven years
old and your Dad is not home for months. He comes for
a few days and then he goes back again. And you only
know that he might never come back. Complete dark is
everywhere. This horror hits everybody, everybody is
losing. If you're lucky enough you won't lose everything.
I was only seven years old when the war started. Most
of my friends are refugees. Sometimes their whole families
were split up and nobody knew for months - even years
- if their parents or children or sister or brother
were alive. Sometimes a family with four members - father,
mother, brother, sister - they were in four different
places. And there was no way to find each other.
I was one of the lucky people. My family is alive.
I know where they are. But I am surrounded with people
who are refugees. They came to my town. But you don't
look at them as refugees. They are new friends, that's
how you see them. They are my best friends at the moment.
They came to school and school is very important for
us to do the only thing you can when the war is going
on - to try to forget it.
I am a member of a youth center in Banja Luka. In that
center there is a group of young people and we work
on the implementation of children's rights. We are trying
to help the refugees, to help them fit in. Being a friend
to someone is the best thing you can do. You don't have
to be a member of a youth center to do something like
that. But through a group we do things together. For
example we make crafts to sell to people on the street.
And with that money we can get enough money to buy candies
and toys and then we give to the orphans and refugee
children. It's a small thing but it means a lot to them.
We are doing also workshops in the schools where we
have a training seminar. Through the workshop the children
get to know what their rights are - like the right to
live, the right to home, education, participation, the
right to play. The more they are aware of what they
can do and what they have a right to do then more things
will be done. Together we can do it.
When you're in a group and that group is made of different
people with different experiences - it helps to get
some ideas. That kind of a group is here at the Children's
Forum, at the United Nations. The main thing I want
to do here is to learn from the others here, the children.
That's the way I will get the knowledge I need and I
will use when I go home and share it with others to
make some progress.
But we also need your help. The best thing you can
do is stop the war - prevent it. That is the only way
to avoid the consequences and everything that war brings.
And that is something that this Council has power to
do. The real question is - is that power used. You are
making decisions here that effect all the nations. That's
the fact. I hope that you will remember my words when
you get the opportunity to make another decision that
could prevent and stop the war.
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